Back the next day for some more action at Spring Drift Matsuri 2006! The place with all the craziest action is usually Minami.

Minami Course looked a bit different back then. No grandstands, and it’s not paved all the way to the wall. It still provided plenty of “whooooa they’re all going to crash” moments though.

Missile cars aren’t a new thing either. They’ve always been around.

Speaking of that, I’d like to address a little issue at this point. I’ve read people commenting on various sites about how the recent popularity of Matsuri amongst foreign drifters has resulted in it being “played out” or something to that effect.

Have…any of those people even been to the event?

Not you Paul, you hate everything and don’t count.

Another good one is about how “foriegners crashing their cars at the track is depleting the already lowering stock of driftable cars in Japan”. I can say without doubt that the drop in the bucket that end up this way is far far less of a cause to popular cars becoming rarer than them being exported all over the world, rusting to death in Japanese weather, being scrapped for the recycle tax and locals crashing them. Get over being a hater and come and have some fun at Ebisu with the rest of us.

OK, here’s a good one. My first lap ever at Minami Course in a borrowed car, with a helmet two sizes too small.

“Whoa shiiiiiiii…”

Of course, it’s nice to see clean cars drifting at Ebisu amongst the pieces of garbage.

Yes, nice and neat. Equips can’t hurt either. Wait, are those two last guys runing exactly the same front wheels?

Well, he’s having fun though, right?

Here’s Kumakubo taking out Antonio. The look on Antonio’s face suggests that they’re going rather fast.

This is my friend Yuusuke Kitaoka in what is now his D1SL Mark II. What makes this photo interesting is that those front fenders, which are custom flared metal and not fibreglass, are the ones that are currently on my car! They were rusting away in his parents’ backyard after he switched to a BN Sports full blister kit, so he gave them to me.

90s are just cool.

Naoto Suenaga was taking out passengers in his old D1SL car. You can see the queue of cars behind him who were all scrambling to follow and try to copy his drifting.

Possibly the worst action photo I have ever taken. At least the steering elbow action is intense.

The Autumn Matsuri is high up on my list of places to go/things to do before I die… Right up there with driving the Nurburgring in a proper car and passing the 200mph mark in the Texas Mile in my JZX83. I realize it might actually take that long, but whatever – what’s a life without goals right?